New York Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers revealed his decision to turn down an offer from Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to become his running mate ahead of this NFL offseason..
In a CNN interview in March, the third-party candidate claimed that Rodgers was one of his top choices for vice presidential pick, but attorney and ex-wife of Google co-founder Sergey Brin, Nicole Shanahan was eventually selected that same month.
Rodgers detailed his reactions about the matter, saying: “I love Bobby (Kennedy), we had a couple of really nice conversations. There were really two options. Retire and be his VP or keep playing. I wanted to keep playing.”
Belonging to possibly the most prominent political family, Kennedy is the son of former United States senator and attorney general Robert F. Kennedy, who also received the 1968 Democratic Party presidential nominee before his assassination that same year, and nephew of 35th American president John F. Kennedy.
The 70-year-old Kennedy has veered more away from Democratic orthodoxy than his family members, gaining political prominence in 2020 due to his scepticism of the COVID-19 vaccine.
Rodgers has also been caught up in a vaccine row, claiming he was “immunized” against COVID-19 before later admitting to an allergy to the vaccine. ESPN published a rant from Rodgers the following year, ahead of his Packers’ playoff defeat, where he slammed the handling of COVID and cast doubt on Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential election win.
